Football

UNCUT SOUTH WEST NON LEAGUE STUFF

Tuesday, 1 September 2009

Ossett Town

Bank Holiday Monday 31st August 2009UniBond NPL Premier LeagueOssett Town 1 FC United of Manchester 2Attendance: 801Admission: £7Programme: £1.50p (Terrible)Tea hut purchases: Mushburger £2.50pWeather: Freakily warm and sunny (raining down the road)Parking: Roadside, about 10 minutes walk from the ground, easy exit.As expected when FC United are on tour there was a decent crowd at the Ingfield Stadium. Most of the people in the ground at half past two were stood outside the function room bar basking in the warm sun and the weirdly warm humidity. I almost expected to see Lou Macari and Gordon McQueen with their hawaiian shirts and pints. How reassuring to see everyone being monitored by policemen in stab-vests and stormtrooper boots. The homely Ossett experienced could be summed up even further by the polite massive sign by the turnstiles "ANYBODY WHO BRINGS FOOD OR DRINK INTO THIS GROUND WILL BE EJECTED". Surely this was an assisting message to waywardly minded fans stupidly thinking that their cheese and pickle wholemeal butties might be better than the Egon Ronay catering in the tea hut? On entering the tea hut it appeared a few FC fans were a bit miffed that they didn't sell pies (this is a football ground remember), some of them left in disgust, a wise choice. Me, Johnny FatArse, bought a cheeseburger for two pounds fifty. It immediately won the stale-bun-of-the-season award even though we are still in August. What I sampled from the filling (which was supposed to be the meat bit) can best be described as horse mush, and this club stop you bringing in your own food, very negative I'm afraid. Walking around the place before kick-off you cannot help notice that most of the buildings are painted black, somebody must have come across a job lot of the stuff for free because surely you would want to brighten up your football ground (wouldn't you)? The teams entered the pitch from the Wendy House changing rooms, which was a nice feature of the touchline stands and soon we were underway. A disastrous defensive error by one of the FC centre backs let Ossett in for a well taken lead and the match took on an ebb and flow which promised a decent game. This proved a false dawn as 15 minutes later the proceedings seemed to run out of steam (possibly due to the warm atmosphere) and everything went very scrappy and niggly. United got the equaliser in the second half and then snatched a dramatic winner in injury time, a bit unfair on Ossett as they deserved the draw over the 90 minutes. I left the ground to the massed ranks of United fans chanting 'Margentina'? A link to FC manager Karl Marginson. My final comment is to advise Ossett Town football club to be a bit more reasonable about the food and to get a proper programme, it only cost £1.50p but I could re-write the valid content on the back of a stamp. You can possibly tell from the vibe of this visit report, this wasn't one of the better trips!